A Hanging at Lotus Hall

by Corrina Lawson

  “Yes.” She traced his face with her fingertips. “The best laid plans oft go awry, Gregor. Be careful, tonight. Please. Even as angry as you can make me, I cannot go through your death again.”

  “Joan.” A sharper tone. “Whatever happens, my family is going to be shattered. There will be many challenges. I need you with me for that.”

  “Do you?” She sighed. “I can’t think past tonight.”

  He released her. “I think of the future often. There are many nights when I lie in bed, wondering when you will decide that it is time to put me aside to pursue other interests, interests not deadly to yourself.”

  “What? You believe I value you so little?”

  “I understand why you refuse marriage. I have changes to make. But I cannot help worrying if the refusal to marry is because you don’t wish to be with me for much longer.”

  When Gregor revealed something, he pulled no punches. He’d finally let her see his fears.

  “Has being dunked in the river addled your brain so much that you question my feelings for you?”

  “I’ve questioned much of the truth of my life in the past day.”

  After a moment, they sighed and put their foreheads together. I love you, Gregor, but dammit. She suspected he was having similar thoughts about her.

  “I know what upheaval in a family can do to one’s emotions,” she confessed. She laced their hands together.

  “You, Gregor Sherringford, son of a noble house, a man possessed of the keenest wits in England, are afraid of losing a half-trained Jewish seamstress with radical ideas, who would be shunned in most circles.”

  He snorted.

  “Gregor, you do vex me.”

  “Joan, you delight me. Always.” He kissed her, and the force of it, the passion, the demand for everything, traveled to her soul.

  Chapter 23

  Jasper and Nick left first, vanishing in the breath between one second and the next. Reg had objected to the magical transportation, on the grounds that Nick hadn’t done this before and he could be killed.

  Nick just laughed.

  No, it wasn’t easy loving a Sherringford.

  Gregor led Joan and Reg out of the cottage for the trek to the outer gardens of Lotus Hall and the hidden door. Reg did the honors on the garden gate with a set of lockpicks.

  “Handier than magic,” Reg noted. “I knew I was right to go back and grab them.”

  “They leave fewer traces as well,” Gregor noted.

  In the distance, Joan could see the faint light of the top of Lotus Hall’s towers. “It’s time for shadow.”

  “Yes.” Joan took Reg’s hand. “This is disconcerting, Reg. Don’t let go of my hand and stay with me. I hope you’re not afraid of the dark.”

  “I’ve always found the dark held less terror than the day,” he replied. “Let’s descend into the underworld, Persephone.”

  Gregor snorted. “I’ll keep the shadows until the underwater ballroom. Then up to the family rooms. Whether we need to all be concealed or just me is uncertain as yet.”

  “Then we do what we can,” she answered. “It’s my plan, Gregor, I know all this.”

  He kissed her while darkness closed over her.

  As they walked in what seemed a void, Joan only received scattered impressions. The joint warmth of Reg and Gregor’s hands in hers. The cold grass under her feet. The smell of wildflowers. Not Gregor’s full cover, which was impenetrable, but close.

  Wood creaked and groaned. The grass under her feet shifted to stone. They descended.

  A thud behind them. The door, being closed.

  Stygian darkness now, and she knew nothing but the touch of the two hands. Gregor halted.

  The black lifted.

  They stood in the center of the underwater ballroom, on top of the great seal of the sun. A half-moon shined down on the glass, making the room almost as bright as in daylight. The stars twinkled in the dark sky. Studies had shown that these were like the Earth’s sun, balls of fire, but Joan wondered how far away they were.

  The world was full of mysteries.

  Beneath them, the magic hummed, a steady, quiet symphony in the back of her mind. It accepted her.

  “I’m not a mage, but something is standing the hairs on my arm straight up,” Reg said.

  “When mage energy is strong enough, it can have qualities that seem like electricity to regular people,” Joan said.

  “Um, does that mean magical attacks seem like lightning bolts?”

  Good question. “Yes, depending on the power inherent in the mage.” She’d never fought anyone like that, but Gregor had not only showed her how, he’d taught her to form her magical force into a shield that could deflect those bolts of force.

  “Shoot first and quick. Right,” Reg said, patting the holster holding his Colts. “That’s always been my plan in dealing with mages.”

  “Have you encountered many?”

  “Enough to know how to survive them.”

  “Then you’re just the man we need,” Gregor whispered.

  “Yep, that’s me, the fool walking into a hornet’s nest of mage power.”

  They slipped into the secret hallway that led to the grand staircase in the great foyer of Lotus Hall, using Joan’s mage light as a guide. She’d decided not to ignite the lanterns that hung above them.

  Reg caressed the polished wood of the walls that seemed to glow, despite the darkness. “Beautiful.”

  “Haven’t you visited the ballroom in your time here?” she asked.

  “Yes, but it looks different tonight. Pulsing.”

  “It looks fey,” she said.

  “Otherworldly. Yes,” Gregor said. “I guess that’s my mother’s doing. She must be expecting us tonight.”

  “So is Moriarty,” she said.

  “But this house magic answers to her,” Gregor answered.

  It also might answer to Jared, but Joan left that unsaid. They already were weaving the pattern. No time for doubt.

  Anne was their first priority and the nursery their first stop. Moriarty would know that, she suspected. It was the obvious place for them to return. Joan’s worst nightmare wasn’t confronting Moriarty. It was finding him gone with the duke and duchess, Anne and Vai already dead.

  God, the baby. Little Jasper. She’d felt his bright light earlier today. And yet that light might be gone, snuffed out.

  Reg had his Peacemakers, at least, a wild card in the magical fight, and she guessed he’d downplayed his experiences with mages. Joan wished his bullets were magically spelled to hit their targets, a power Milverton’s late brother possessed. But she suspected Reg had excellent aim.

  Joan held her breath as they passed through the false door and into the great foyer. It was empty, though. Inside the paintings, the Himalayas glowed an eerie green, instead of the usual white. What that portended, she could only guess.

  Gregor put his finger on the side of his nose, betraying the twinkle to his eye present at the climax of all investigations. She smiled. Yes, now they would have answers.

  And victory.

  Then, Gregor vanished into the shadows once more.

  “Sure he’s not a real ghost?” Reg asked.

  “He does love his exits.”

  As they ascended the steps to the family quarters, the magic pulsing under the floor shifted. She was hit with a wave of panic that near doubled her over. The power bleeding from the walls and floors of the west wing throbbed with pain and fear, so strong it stole her breath and strength.

  Reg grabbed her around the waist or she might have tumbled down the steps. She held tight to his muscled forearm, seeking to block out the intrusion.

  “What is it?” he whispered.

  “Echoes of trauma through the magic,” she said through gritted teeth. Wrong, all wrong, and they hadn’t even reached the nursery yet.

  Gregor appeared at her side, crowding out Reg.

  “Explain because I feel nothing,” Gregor whispered in her ear. “And don’t fear
discovery, I’ve called shadows to hide us all.”

  She fished for the right words. Gregor was logic, not emotion. State it plainly. “The house’s magic is all fear and pain, not light and joy, as it was.”

  A few seconds passed.

  “Gregor?” she prodded.

  He stroked her hair, a movement hidden from Reg. “It could be my mother sending a warning via magical channels. ‘Get out, now.’”

  “Then our enemy is waiting for us,” she said. “This is likely a trap.”

  “Indeed. But we already knew that.”

  “Yeah.” Reg drew out one of his Colts. “Let’s go. Time’s a-wasting.”

  “Change of plans,” Gregor said. “I’ll cloak all of us until we’re in the nursery. Then we will see if your theory about my power being enough to counter Moriarty is valid, Joan.”

  “I’m right,” she said.

  Gregor kissed her cheek. “Together again, then.” He took hold of Reg’s wrist.

  In between one breath and the next, the inky depths of Gregor’s power enclosed them again. The seething pain vanished, as if it had never been.

  It seemed they stumbled along in an infinite void.

  As before, Joan walked but could not tell where. She felt her knees lift to climb stairs. Narrow, she concluded, meaning they’d taken the servants’ staircase, which also accounted for the slight dizziness that had her off-balance.

  Reg grunted. His hand lay on her back as they walked in single file.

  Gregor’s breathing stayed even, in and out, no sign of stress, and Joan keyed her breathing to his. Reg breathed heavier, through his mouth, as if he feared the air itself might disappear if he didn’t get it all into his lungs.

  Despite how afraid he must be, he remained silent.

  Gregor halted. Three taps on her ring finger meant they were close to their destination. Anything could happen at any moment. She reached for Reg, found his hand, and squeezed it, signaling something was about to happen.

  She closed her free hand around the lotus locket, her gift from Gregor, and opened it, revealing her grandmother’s locket. Her centering item, the heart of her power, and she’d need it all tonight. She silently recited a prayer.

  The seething magic receded, gone as if it had never been. Her power, or something else?

  A door opened. The shadows vanished, and Joan and Reg stood in the middle of the darkened nursery.

  Joan spotted the headmaster on the couch below the window. Anne’s head was in his lap. The girl looked asleep. He stroked her hair.

  “Ah, I see you’ve arrived, on schedule. Careful now. One thought from me could kill the girl,” Moriarty said.

  Joan sensed a swirl of mage power around him. A trap, indeed. “What do you want?” Joan asked.

  “Shush. We don’t want to wake the other sleeper.” Moriarty pointed to his feet. Another figure lay on the floor, seemingly unconscious.

  Jared Sherringford, Duke of Bennington.

  “What could you possibly gain from this?” Joan stood in front of Reg, hopefully hiding the guns under his coat.

  “Perhaps I gain revenge for Samuel’s death.” Phyllis appeared from her bedroom, a pistol in her hand. “I know the duke killed the man I love.”

  Phyllis was allied with Moriarty?

  Of all the developments the last few days, this was the one that truly shocked Joan. “I don’t understand, Phyllis. Moriarty killed Samuel Cooper.”

  “A lie! Our honorable duke killed Sam.”

  None of this made sense. “Moriarty, by his own admission, was with the duke at the time of the murder.”

  “He could hardly implicate the duke in his own home!”

  The paintings in the nursery began to glow with power, filled with the rage of their artist. Joan wondered if the flower stems could slither from the walls and strangle them.

  “But yes, Mr. Moriarty moved the body,” Phyllis continued. “He made certain the death could not be covered up. He and I will also make certain that Sherringfords pay.”

  Phyllis aimed her pistol at Joan. The governess’s hand was steady, her gaze unblinking.

  “You’d trust Moriarty, a relative stranger, over the people you know?” Joan asked. She glanced at Moriarty. He was smiling at some inner joke, like the proverbial Cheshire Cat.

  He’d gotten to Phyllis. He controlled her, as surely as he’d insinuated himself into Anne’s mind.

  At least the little girl was asleep for this.

  “I’m done trusting this family. They’ve proven themselves capable of the worst deceptions,” Phyllis said. “I thought I had my father back, but it was all a lie. Or do you deny it?”

  Joan said in a soft voice, “I only discovered that deception today. The lie was cruel to you. You have a grievance.”

  “A grievance? Is that what you’d call it?” Rage filled Phyllis’s voice and pulsed on the walls. “It was beyond cruel to taunt me so. I can’t trust them anymore, if I ever could. After all, they never treated me as their equal.”

  Phyllis tapped Jared’s feet with her boot. “The duke killed Sam to keep me in servitude in Lotus Hall.”

  “What proof did Moriarty offer to convince you of this?” Joan said, hoping to draw this out long enough for reinforcements to arrive. Gregor was here, with her, and Jasper, Nick, and Vai must be somewhere in the home.

  “Proof! The duke himself confessed it all tonight! He said he killed Cooper to keep me in this house, under his control.”

  Jared was under Moriarty’s control. He might have said anything Moriarty wanted. Joan wanted to grab Phyllis, shake her out of this rage. But if she were Phyllis, she might well hold the Sherringfords responsible.

  “Is the child, too, guilty of something?” Reg cut in. “Because you’re threatening her, much as you are us.”

  Phyllis’s pistol flicked to Reg. “Her father failed Anne. It’s his fault she’s like this. She saw the murder, he used magic to make her forget, and now she’s near lost her mind at the violation. She’s near killed her mother. It’s better she’s away from him.”

  “Away where?” Joan asked. That boded ill.

  “Away, where she can learn about her gift safe from her twisted family.”

  “Like many peers, the Sherringfords have proven themselves unworthy of their power,” Moriarty drawled. “The girl is better off with me, as the future of this realm is better in the hands of the Metaphysical Society and the Commons, not with the dissolute noble peers.”

  Moriarty said the last staring at her. He knew about the list. He knew that she knew he’d killed all those noble mages.

  “Sherringfords lie. All of them,” Moriarty said to Phyllis. “Even now, one is deceiving us, Miss Dale.” He stroked Anne’s hair again. “Come out, Lord Gregor, lest I get itchy with your niece.”

  Joan clenched her hand around her grandmother’s locket, drawing strength from centering herself, pushing aside fear and anger and regret at not discovering the murderer before now.

  And she waited for Gregor’s signal for the right moment to attack.

  Moriarty stared at her. “What are you doing?” He narrowed his eyes. “You don’t have that much power. You can’t. It’s an illusion.”

  Joan grinned. The lotus locket, created by Vai so long ago to mask mage power, had covered over Joan’s pendant and fooled even Moriarty.

  Moriarty, who had led her mother to destruction.

  “Want to find out how powerful I am?” Joan asked. “I’m not so desperate as my mother was, you know.”

  Moriarty let his power flow. “Out, Lord Gregor, or the girl dies.”

  Darkness coalesced near the doorway as Gregor dropped his veil.

  “None of my family dies tonight.” Gregor glanced at Phyllis. “None of them. Including you.”

  “You side with them!” Phyllis spat the words at him.

  “I stand with the innocent against the guilty,” Gregor countered. “Moriarty has been destroying his magical rivals among the nobility for years, cousin. Coope
r found him out and Moriarty killed him.”

  Moriarty shrugged. “Phyllis, I told you they would twist this.”

  “Why didn’t Moriarty accuse the duke when Cooper’s body was found?” Joan asked Phyllis.

  “Magical crimes are beyond the authorities, as we all know. I needed to find out how deep the corruption went at Lotus Hall.” Moriarty answered the question himself, his power like a storm around him. Phyllis rushed to his side, the gun always steady in her hand.

  “The Sherringfords only care about power. Trying to pass off an imposter as my father only proves it,” Phyllis said.

  “Phyllis Dale finally saw the truth and I’m quite grateful.” Moriarty set his hand on the governess’s shoulder. Mage power flowed between them. Joan clenched her fists. Moriarty was controlling her.

  “It does puzzle me, however, why you, Miss Krieger, don’t stand with us,” he said.

  “Those who stand with you are under your control.”

  Moriarty smirked. “No, they’ve seen the light. The future is with people like us, mages of great power, despite our birth. Anyone with the gift can be a mage, with the right training.” He tapped the duke with his foot again. “He feared common mages. That’s why he tinkered with the bill. Well, there will be no tinkering now. He’s disgraced.”

  “This is all about power, then,” Gregor said.

  “It’s always about power, isn’t it, detective?” Moriarty laughed, no mirth to it. “The future awaits and I’m going to write it, for all mages.”

  “With your rivals dead and Jared disgraced, you’ll be the power behind the Mage Reform Act,” Gregor said. “The power behind the throne, yes? Or, even better, Prime Minister Moriarty?”

  Moriarty shrugged.

  “That’s not going to happen now, is it?” Joan said. “It’ll be hard to rule the Empire from prison.”

  “Prison? Oh, no. I’ll be the hero of the realm.” He grinned. “The Duke of Bennington snapped. Killed his family after murdering Mr. Cooper.” He put his hand over his heart. “Alas, Lady Anne and Miss Dale were the only ones I could save.”